A Highlander Christmas (17 page)

His strokes were slow, thorough. She could hardly bear it, the pressure deep within her, the ache to be filled with his fingers.

And then his mouth had kissed her
there
, and he had whispered darkly,
Open to me.

“Issy? Issy?” Fiona called.

Isobel struggled back from her dream and into reality. How she wanted to relive that part, when her dream lover had slid along the length of her body and insinuated himself between her thighs, kissing and touching her for hours. He had made her cry out, tear at her sheets, beg for something she didn’t know how to name.

“I’m sorry?” Isobel asked, trying to hide the huskiness in her voice. “You were saying?”

“Not me. You were the one speaking. Then you just stopped.”

Isobel flushed. “Oh yes. I was wondering how long
you
have known about the earl?” she asked, refusing to think of how she had awakened that morning, thoroughly aroused. Her nipples had been hard little points against her nightgown, and her thighs had been wet. In the dream, her stranger had kissed and touched her until she had shook and wetness had leaked from her. He had liked it. Had told her so. Those hours had awakened a pleasure and passion she didn’t realize could exist between man and woman.

Just a dream, she told herself. She’d only had it because she was angry at her father and Stuart for drawing up a contract with St. Clair. There would be no love, no warmth with the earl. There certainly would not be the intimacy she’d known in her dream. She could not imagine the earl caressing her so tenderly, putting his fingers against her most intimate place, lapping at her and whispering to her as her stranger had.

“Issy?” Isobel shuddered, realizing Fiona was looking at her strangely. “Are you all right? You’re positively flushed!”

“Fine,” she muttered, and resolved to put the dream out of her mind. Reaching for a strand of shimmering gold braiding, she wove it in and out of the bough. “The gas lamps will add a nice effect to this braiding, don’t you think?”

“I think you’re avoiding my question.”

Isobel sighed and dropped onto the brocade settee. Boxes of Christmas decorations were strewn beside her. Even now, one of the downstairs maids was up in the attic searching for more.

Normally, decorating MacDonald Hall for the annual Christmas ball was the highlight of the season, but this year, her heart wasn’t in it. She half wondered if St. Clair celebrated the holidays. He’d certainly never put much effort into making merry on the occasions that he had traveled to the hall for Christmas.

Isobel couldn’t imagine being married to such a boring man. Handsome or not, the Earl of St. Clair was not who she would have picked for her lifelong partner.

“And who would you have picked?” Fiona asked.

Isobel groaned. “I hadn’t realized I said the words aloud,” she muttered. Lord, she really was out of sorts today.

“Well?” Fiona asked again as she placed some candles among the greenery. “What sort of man would you wish for?”

“One who loves me,” Isobel muttered in a huff. “I don’t think that’s asking too much.”

“And what else?”

Isobel emptied a box of red and gold balls onto a velvet cushion. Without looking at Fiona, she replied, “Passion seems the sort of thing one might ask for in a marriage.”

“Indeed,” Fiona said, smiling, “passion is a must.”

Fiona and Stuart had that in spades. Every time Isobel turned around, Fiona was in Stuart’s arms, their lips pressed together. And each time Isobel saw them like that, she longed for the same with a man of her own.

“What makes you think that you will not have passion with the Earl?”

Isobel shrugged. “I don’t think the Earl feels strongly about anything other than his lands and his money. A wife, I think, would come in a distant third, possibly even fourth, after his favorite hound.”

Standing, Isobel kicked the train of her dark emerald green gown behind her and straightened her bustle. She then proceeded to the giant pine tree that stood in the corner of the parlor. With little hooks, she placed a few of the red balls on the branches before standing back to see where more balls and ornaments might be placed. After the decorations were all on, the candles and garland would come next. That task had always been left for Stuart and Ewan, who were, of course, nowhere to be found.

Behind her, Fiona came up and hugged her tight. “Have an open mind, Issy, you might find you’re wrong about the Earl.”

“Not bloody likely,” she snorted. The proper Earl of St. Clair would probably swoon if he heard her unladylike talk. But then, Isobel doubted very much it was her good manners the earl was interested in. Her dowry, more likely.

“Well, now,” came the sound of Stuart’s voice. “You’re supposed to be resting.”

Fiona ignored her husband’s pointed gaze. “And you’re supposed to be helping trim the tree.”

Stuart sauntered into the room and placed a kiss on his wife’s lips. “What about a sleigh ride?” he asked. “I’ve asked the groom to have the horses readied.”

Isobel hoped she could prevail upon Stuart to stop at the forest. She’d lost her clan pin yesterday, and she had a feeling it was in the woods where her scarf had gotten tangled in the low branches.

Her clan pin was a MacDonald heirloom. Handed down through the female line, she’d been eighteen when her grandmother MacDonald had given it to her. She couldn’t allow it to be lost. Not when she’d dreamed of giving it to her daughter someday.

“A sleigh ride is a lovely idea, Stuart. I shall tell cook to prepare a crock of wassail, and we can sip it along the way.”

“Perhaps, then, Miss MacDonald, you would be so kind as to accompany me.”

Isobel whirled around. In the doorway was the Earl of St. Clair, looking sullen and not at all interested in a brisk ride in the cold. “Good day, my lord,” she replied while curtsying. “What brings you to the hall yet again today?” Lord, was this to be a daily penance? she wondered. Could she expect the earl to arrive on her doorstep every afternoon?

A strange look passed between the earl and her brother. His mouth moved, but no sound came out. Then he pierced her with his gray eyes. “Your brother has been so kind as to invite me to be a guest of your family for Christmas.”

“Has he?” she asked sweetly, while casting Stuart a venomous glance. “How thoughtful he is. Will you be staying through to twelfth night?” She almost feared his answer. When he nodded, she gritted her teeth. Two weeks with the earl. She’d rather have a tooth pulled.

“Well?” St. Clair drawled, offering his arm. “Shall we? I would be honored if you would enjoy the ride with me.”

“Of course, my lord. I shall change and be with you directly. Stuart, you will be chaperoning, of course.”

“Of course.”

Of course
. Everything was arranged. She was to be married off to the earl. She would be a countess, a true lady. She would have estates in England and Scotland. Her future husband was handsome and rich. And she was most likely the most miserable woman in Scotland.

Thank goodness Fiona and Stuart were sharing the sleigh with them. Isobel was not yet ready to be alone with the man. Lord, she didn’t even know his Christian name. Or his favorite color, or . . . or any of the other meaningless things couples learn about each other during a courtship.

Worse, she didn’t think the earl was the sort of man who knew the first thing about courting. He seemed most uncomfortable sitting beside her. Whenever their shoulders or knees would touch, he stiffened as though a brisk gust of air had blown down his collar. And sharing a lap fur with him was far too intimate for Isobel.

Across the sleigh, Stuart blew on his hands to warm them, and Fiona reached for them, drawing them inside her rabbit fur muff. Isobel arched her brows and looked out at the beautiful hills that passed them by. If the earl hoped she might bestow the same sort of kindness, he was hoping in vain.

“Shall we sing a carol?” Fiona asked. Stuart groaned and the earl positively glowered.

“Oh, let’s!” Isobel agreed, relishing the look of pain on the earl’s face. “I love singing, though I croak like a frog.” She laughed, watching as his expression of pain deepened. “Don’t you love singing, my lord?”

“I . . . I . . .” He moved his head, stretching his neck as though his tie was strangling him. “I do not sing myself, but would like nothing more than to hear your voice. I’ve always thought you sing like an angel.”

Drat. She had sung every year at the ball, and St. Clair had heard her. There went her idea for sending him packing by singing like a fishwife.

“I only know the words to ‘God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen,’ ” Stuart replied irritably. “If you would sing, it’ll have to be that one.”

“Well, then, shall we begin?”

As they sang the opening bars of the carol, St. Clair maneuvered the reins to turn the sleigh in the direction of the forest. Despite her attempts to be sulky, Isobel found herself enjoying the ride and the fresh, crisp air of the afternoon. She loved Christmas. The food, the carols, the presents. But most of all she loved spending time at MacDonald Hall. For most of the year, her family was in London. Stuart and her father owned a steel factory that supplied the railroads. It was only during Christmas that Isobel came back to the country of her birth, and the home they had shared when her mother was alive.

“Shall we stop and take a stroll?” the earl asked.

“I’d love a walk,” Isobel agreed. “And I’d like to find some more holly for the centerpieces.”

“Then we are agreed.” The earl pulled the dapple-grays to a stop right before the forest. “This seems as good a place as any to stop.”

Isobel froze as she remembered being in the forest and emerging from the exact spot where the sleigh now stood. She recalled the stag. The raven. The voice she had heard whispered on the breeze. She was certain it was those memories that provoked her into dreaming of that strange man. A man who was vastly different from the Earl of St. Clair.

“Shall we?” St. Clair offered her his hand. “I believe we will find lots of holly in the woods.”

Isobel followed beside him while Fiona and Stuart contented themselves with picking pine cones from the trees at the edge of the wood.

“Are you not afraid of venturing into the wood?”

“Of course not, my brother is only footsteps away,” she replied.

The earl chuckled. “I do not refer to myself, Miss MacDonald, but the other creatures who reside there.”

“Rabbit and deer, do you mean, my lord? Hardly imposing creatures,” she laughed, deftly stepping over a thick tree root.

“I meant the Otherworld folk.”

Isobel stopped short. “Do you mean to tell me that you believe in faeries and trolls and unicorns?”

“Not trolls and unicorns, but faeries, aye. I believe in the Sidhe.”

“You’re superstitious.”

“Do you not believe in the stories of our ancestors?”

She had once. It seemed like such a long time ago when her mother and grandmother had spoken of the faeries and their enchanted forests. Of course, they meant to frighten her away from venturing into the woods. Only the stories hadn’t frightened her, but enticed her.

She’d been enticed into the woods yesterday, as well.

“Have you ever been in the woods, Miss MacDonald, and heard something strange? Have you ever felt as though there were eyes upon you, watching you from the cover of trees and moss? ”

Isobel shivered. “I . . . I don’t know what you mean, my lord.”

He smiled. “I think you’re every bit as superstitious as me.”

“Does that surprise you?”

“Aye. And it pleases me as well. We’ll have something to talk about once we are wed.” Isobel gritted her teeth at the smugness she heard.

“You presume much,” she said haughtily, letting her hand drop from his arm. She walked away from him, ignoring his sharp intake of breath. He reached for her arm and pulled her to a stop.

“You cannot feign ignorance, Miss MacDonald. I made my intentions quite clear to you this past summer, before you turned tail and ran off to London. Your father has agreed. I will have you for a wife.”

“Why?” she asked. “There are many women who would have you in a trice. Why pick me?”

“Your father and I—” The earl stopped and looked up at the swaying trees. “Did you hear that? Someone called my name.”

She hadn’t, but Isobel was eager for a reprieve, no matter how short. “Stuart, I think. I’ll wait while you see what he wants.”

St. Clair looked skeptical, but then his eyes narrowed and his head cocked to the side as if he were listening. “Do not go any farther. I will return in a minute.”

Isobel scowled at the command and lifted the hem of her long cloak. She would do what she pleased. Besides, she had her clan pin to find. She had a feeling it would be where she had seen her stag. She remembered her scarf getting tangled in the branches and knew that was what happened to her pin. And she would get it, despite what St. Clair, the stuffed shirt, had to say about going deeper into the woods alone.

Rounding the clearing of trees and roots, Isobel stepped over a few of the branches that had fallen to the ground. She was certain this was the spot. Falling to her knees, she searched through the thin layer of snow, pine needles and dried leaves for the silver pin.